Sunday, August 26, 2007

Road Trip

We loaded Zac's stuff under our new tonneau cover Friday night because Saturday is my longest day at work and we wanted to get an early start Sunday morning for our trip to State College, Pa.

Our planned route would take us thru Memphis and Nashville, Tn., Louisville, Ky., Cincinnati and Columbus, Oh., Wheeling,WV., Pittsburgh, Pa. and finally State College, Pa. The first leg of our trip would be about 1070 miles.

After helping Zac, we would use the rest of the week for our vacation by driving south thru the Smoky Mountains.

Sunday morning we fueled the truck and was on our way by 7 am. About an hour later Zac called and said he and his mom were just leaving ( 2 hours earlier than I had predicted). I set the cruise control on the posted speed limit of 70mph ( I rarely drive my little S-10 over 65 mph) and let the Cummins diesel rumble east.

This was our first "road trip" in our Dodge 3/4 ton and we found the ride to be rather nice for a large truck and the room inside compared to our S-10 was amazing.

I always have an ice chest in our truck and on vacation we carry picnic supplies as well as our drinks ( sodas and lots of water). We stopped east of Jackson, Tn. at a rest area and had a picnic lunch. The hour or so it takes to spread a table cloth and prepare proper sandwiches ( as compared to having just meat and bread) always is time well spent as it fuels our bodies and gives us a much needed break. A sandwich with all the trimmings and chips just taste better at a picnic table than it does at the kitchen table. I called Zac and told him where we were, he and his mom were grabbing a fast food burger in Jackson and would pass us before we had finished our picnic lunch.

We always picnic lunch or grab a burger and try to have a nice evening meal if time and place permits. That meal came at Cincinnati, Oh., I then took a wrong turn that added about 25 miles to our trip.

We stopped for the night at Columbus, Oh. (over 800 miles for the day) and Zac and his mom were spending the night in Wheeling, WV.

Pittsburgh to State College is under construction so we decided to grab a burger for lunch when we were about an hour out. Zac called and they were there. He was not a "happy camper". He had to rent his place without ever seeing it in person ( he would be sharing a townhouse with 2 other people) and he informed me that it was in total disarray.

Jeff (the lessee ) had not been there all summer and the other guy would be moving out before school started. He had been letting other people crash at the house all summer and it was a total pigsty. He could care less ( I'm sure his mama didn't raise him that way) as he had already been returned his deposit and would be gone in a week. Add that to the fact the guy that was renting Zac's room still had his stuff stored in the living room as his new place was still occupied. It literally looked like a "crack house". The guy seemed nice enough, just a slob.

When we arrived, Zac was just returning with cleaning supplies. Being a fastidious person, the house would get a transformation in the next 3 hours.

After our cleaning and straightening the place was looking better and as soon as the extra stuff is gone, it will be fine.

After unloading our truck, Zac and I picked up a bed that he had purchased earlier in the day and and then unloaded his Santa Fe. We all had pizza at Pizza Hut and back to Wally World pillows and a few other things he needed.

His mom would be flying back on Thursday so he was in good hands. After our goodbyes, we were off on the rest of our vacation. Being a college town we found the motels outrageously high ( little did we know that was Pa. in general), so we drove east before spending the night.